There's nothing like an awards show to give the music industry a nice, warm feeling of smugness and satisfaction. In the past month, the Grammies have grinned with pride as Eminem shocked the entire nation by dueting with Elton John, and the Brits have shown their patriotic zeal by giving a major award to an Irish band, U2.
Back home, however, the gongs have been silent for the past couple of years, and the sound of mutual back-slapping has been muted to say the least.
The Hot Press Awards was a no-show last year. The rival Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) Awards, usually held at the Burlington Hotel and shown on RTE television, has been off the air since 1997.
Enter the Meteor Ireland Music Awards or, rather, reenter the IRMAs under a new brand name. The awards, which will be held at the Point Theatre tonight and broadcast on Network 2 on Sunday at 8.30 p.m., will feature such top music stars as Elton John, Sinead O'Connor, Ronan Keating, David Gray and Emmylou Harris.
On the eve of St Patrick's Day, tonight's extravaganza will celebrate all that is marketable and money-spinning about Irish music. It will be sponsored by Ireland's newest mobile phone service, Meteor. The event is the result of a collaboration between promoters MCD and IRMA, a body comprising executives from the major record labels.
"The IRMAs just kind of fizzled out," says Mr Freddie Middleton, chairman of the IRMA committee. "When we started them 15 years ago, there weren't that many other major awards events around Europe, so we found it easier to get the stars to appear."
While many high-profile guests made the trip to the Burlington, more often than not, stars would send videotaped messages apologising for their absence, or just simply send someone local along to collect their award. "People got tired of guests not being available because they were doing similar shows around the world," says Mr Middleton. "So the awards came to a natural end."
Last year, however, Mr Middleton called a meeting of the IRMA committee and asked the members if they wanted to stage a brand new awards ceremony in 2001. The spur, says Mr Middleton, was that some of the most successful international artists of 2000 were Irish.
"Whether you say Westlife or Samantha Mumba, the Corrs or U2, it's not giving away any secrets to say that they sold a lot of records last year," he says. "The awards are based on the best-selling albums and singles of 2000, so you can guess who'll be up for an award." The original idea, says Mr Middleton, was to make it a Late Late Show special, much like the annual fashion awards, and bill it as a celebration of home-grown music. A date was set for April 27th, but then it was learned that Denis Desmond, of concert promoters MCD, had pencilled in a similar event, the Ireland Awards, for St Patrick's weekend.
"We got in touch with Denis, told him what we were planning and asked if he'd like to incorporate the two events into one big ceremony. He was already far down the road with his show, so it was easier for us to come forward to his date. We're not promoters and we wouldn't have been able to compete with Denis, so we got into bed with MCD and consummated the deal."
The IRMA committee is made up of executives from the big five record labels - BMG, Universal, EMI, Sony and Warners - so they could promise to fly in a star-studded line-up of international guests, thus negating the need for written or taped apologies.
In turn, MCD would handle the logistics of staging the event and also bag a sponsor. Meteor had just introduced its 085 mobile phone service in Ireland on February 22nd, so it seized the opportunity to be associated with these high-profile awards.
"We felt this would be the perfect event for us to be involved with," says Ms Karen Flynn, Meteor's director of consumer marketing. "We consider ourselves a youthful brand rather than a youth culture brand, and we wanted to be associated with something that was fresh and fun. The appeal of music is strong and youthful, and it talks to a large and pertinent audience.
Other music stars joining Elton John at the Point tonight are Lisa Stansfield, Gabrielle, Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, Morcheeba, Atomic Kitten and Altan; racing driver Damon Hill; dancer Jean Butler; and movie star Matthew McConaughey.
The show will be hosted by comedian Ed Byrne and broadcast by Tara in the UK and on the Internet.
Awards will be presented in such categories as Best Selling Irish Album, Best Irish Live Act, Critics Album of the Year, Irish Hope for 2001, and Lifetime Award. Each of the winners will receive an award sculpture designed by Irish artist, Jim Fitzpatrick.
There are 1,000 tickets for the event, each costing £200, but none will be on sale to the public. Instead, the record companies will buy blocks of tickets, which they will give to invited guests.
The IRMA committee hopes the event will raise at least £100,000 for Elton John's AIDS Foundation, to be disbursed to Irish-based charities. The balance will go the IRMA Trust, to help fund a series of master classes and an instrument bank for musicians.
Both Mr Middleton and Ms Flynn are confident there will be a Meteor Irish Music Awards 2002. A tentative date has already been set.
